Latest news

Earlier today Brazil court ordered mobile carriers to block WhatsApp traffic because the company had failed to cooperate in an investigation. The app that is used by over 90 million people in Brazil – and same percentage of internet users – was quickly unblocked.

The initial ban was meant to go on for 48 hours but was overturned by a São Paulo judge before the first 24 hours had expired. According to BBC, Judge Xavier de Souza said that it was "not reasonable that millions of users be affected by the inertia of the company".

Most of Brazil's internet users also use WhatsApp because of the high prices of traditional texting and mobile phone plans in general. As much as 93 percent of the country's internet population uses Facebook owned app, TechCrunch reports.

Some have questioned if the reasons for blocking are tied with the investigations of criminal activity within the messaging service or if it's a plot by the telecoms. The latter can be refuted by the fact that blocking a single service would not stop people from using online messaging. The messaging app Telegram proved the point by gaining millions of users immediately after the ban.

Thanks to a new domain registration, it appears that Ubisoft is preparing an Assassin' Creed collection anthology.

Ubi has registered "assassinscreedcollection.com", suggesting they are working on a collection for the action-adventure series although for the time being we will take that as speculation.

Like other publishers have in the past, there is a good chance the company will compile a group of remastered AC titles from previous consoles and sell it for PS4 and Xbox One.

Ubisoft has already gone down the collections road, releasing Assassin's Creed: The Americas collection, and Assassin's Creed: Heritage collection (for PS3 and Xbox 360) so the latest game could be similar.

Mac anti-virus provider MacKeeper has exposed 13 million customer records and left customer passwords vulnerable to cracking.

White hat researcher Chris Vickery said he found four IP addresses that directed him straight into the company's MongoDB database, where names, emails, usernames, password hashes, phone numbers, system info and IP addresses were all stored without protection (for the most part). The passwords were using the easily crackable MD5 hash, although they weren't even salted.

Even more shocking was that the database did not require any kind of administrator password or username to get in. Vickery used the Shodan 'hacker search engine' to find the open database.

Vickery tried to contact the company first but could not get through so he posted the issues on Reddit. The company then responded and fixed the issues within hours. "Analysis of our data storage system shows only one individual gained access performed by the security researcher himself. We have been in communication with Chris and he has not shared or used the data inappropriately," the MacKeeper team wrote in a blog post.

Authorities in the UK have arrested a 21-year-old man in London in connection with the VTech hack that left the personal data of 6.4 million children exposed.

The man could be charged with violating the Computer Misuse Act of 1990, even though there is no evidence that the man sold the data after taking it.

VTech, the Chinese company that builds educational toys for kids, was easily breached with an SQL injection, with profiles on 6.4 million kids (including gender and birth dates) exposed in addition to details from 5 million parent's accounts, all of which included full addresses, secret questions/answers,passwords, IP addresses and links to their kid's profiles.

Most of those affected are located in the U.S., France, UK and Germany and all have been notified.

Internet flash sale retailer Gilt Groupe is preparing to sell itself for $250 million, under a quarter of what it was valued in 2011.

In 2011, venture capitalists placed a valuation of $1.1 billion on the company, which was seeing exponential growth at the time.

Even more upsetting for investors is the fact that Gilt has raised $280 million in capital since 2007, suggesting most investors will lose on this deal. Hudson Bay Co., the owner of Saks Fifth Avenue, is the likely buyer.

In 2014, the company had $600 million in revenue and Hudson Bay plans to pair Gilt with its own Saks Off 5th brand discount site and stores, with the potential for Gilt popup shops.

Other flash sale sites have also struggled post-recession, as major retailers have made discounts the "norm" and popularity has waned significantly.

Google has updated their Maps for iOS app, adding a plethora of new, significant features.

The updated app adds offline navigation, adds real-time gas prices when you search for gas stations and also adds what times are popular for millions of business and locations.

Google's changelog says the app now allows you to "See popular times at more than a million places around the world" and "See up-to-date gas prices when searching for gas stations in the US and Canada," and soon you'll be able to download a map "and the next time there's no connectivity -- whether it's a country road or an underground parking garage -- Google Maps will continue to work seamlessly."

Android received the updates last month and now iPhone and iPad users can get in on the action.

Smartphone manufacturers, especially the big ones, love their predictable release cycles. Apple releases an iPhone every fall and Samsung releases a top-of-the-line Galaxy S every spring.

Samsung's Galaxy S7 is "the next big thing", as Samsung likes to put it, but might steal once more a trick or two from Apple.

The rumors have it that Samsung will be unveiling the follow-up to Galaxy S6 (pictured) in February and start selling the phone as early as March. But it is the main features that Wall Street Journal is reporting on now. One of them being the key new feature of this years iPhone.

According to the WSJ sources the Galaxy S7 will feature a pressure-sensitive display, quite like the 3D Touch Apple introduces with the new iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus. Less surprisingly Samsung in said to upgrade the USB port to the new speedier and reversible Type-C port.

Electronic Arts has announced it is launching an esports division to be run by current COO Peter Moore.

The new division, EA Competitive Gaming Division, will focus on creating competitions for popular EA franchises like Madden and FIFA and "includes initiatives to create competitive experiences with our games."

Moore has been COO for EA since 2011, and will now become Chief Competition Officer and executive vice president. Moore is not new to gaming competitions having helped run the EA Sports Challenge Series and the FIFA Interactive World Cup.

"The formation of the Competitive Gaming Division is a groundbreaking opportunity for Electronic Arts to celebrate your passion for play and competition," said EA CEO Andrew Wilson.

Earlier this year, Activision Blizzard announced their foray into esports, as did Microsoft Studios with other large studios expected to start their own divisions in 2016, as well.

Microsoft has released an official apology to the customers who have bought their new Surface devices – or more specifically to those who've had "a less-than-perfect experience". The official apology comes with a promise to do everything to fix the issues with Surface Pro 4 and Surface Book.

Microsoft notes that it has already issued several software updates to fix some of the bugs people have experienced with the devices and their Windows 10. The flickering displays were already fixed and now it's time to tackle the lacking Sleep mode.

Users have been surprised that after putting their devices to Sleep they've awoken them with barely any battery life. Microsoft has acknowledged the problem and will be fixing the Sleep mode in a software update in early 2016.

The message titled "A Note to Our Customers from The Microsoft Surface Team" doesn't do much else than assure that everything is done to right the wrongs and fix the bugs. For now all you can do is replace Sleep mode with Hibernation. More details on this temporary fix you can find from an article by Windows Central.

To the surprise of some iPhone users, Apple has started pushing aggressive advertisement to App Store users with an older iPhone models. A full screen popup ad is a new strategy in Apple's arsenal.

The popup ad (shown below) opens up as the first thing when opening the App Store on iPhone. It suggests an upgrade to the new "ridiculously powerful" iPhone 6s.

Apple has yet to comment on this advertisement but it appears that it is directed at iPhone users with models that predate iPhone 6. There's no word on what markets are affected by this but we've heard reports from the US and the UK, as with the tweet below.

This might be the first time that Apple uses App Store to promote its new devices but it certainly isn't the first time Apple is cross-promoting its other products on App Store. And it is fairly certain that the effect of this type of advertisement has been extensively discussed in Cupertino, and that the positives (sales) outweigh the negative feedback.

Wal-Mart has announced its own mobile payment service, dubbed 'Walmart Pay,' as the massive retailer follows in the footsteps of other companies.

Walmart Pay is free and will be available for iOS and Android allowing cosnumers to pay with any major credit, debit, prepaid or Walmart gift card.

The launch of Walmart Pay seems to suggest that CurrentC, the mobile wallet service being developed for years now by a group of retailers (including Wal-Mart, Best Buy, Target and others) is nowhere near ready for the big time, despite millions of dollars spent in R&D and years of development.

Walmart Pay is a little different than current mobile payment options in that you choose the payment option within the Walmart Pay mobile app then scan a barcode at the register with your phone's camera. You are then sent an e-receipt.

The mobile payments app will be available nationwide in early 2016 but your nearest location may already be using it.

T-Mobile has announced yet another promotion for carrier switchers, this time looking for Verizon users.

From today until December 17th, any user that switches from Verizon to T-Mobile will get a $100 gift code to use towards premium Hulu plans. Basic Hulu costs $8 per month with ads, and the unlimited ad-free tier costs $12 per month.

"Verizon customers put up with a lot of sneaky tricks from Big Red these days. Overpriced data, shocking overage penalties and no early upgrade option – just to name a few," T-Mobile CEO John Legere added. "So while Verizon spends billions of dollars on TV ads screaming that 'better matters,' we are going to show their customers why the Un-carrier is better with a real gift, half-off the best accessories and a full year of Hulu that comes with unlimited LTE streaming with Binge On at T-Mobile."

Additionally, T-Mobile covers early termination fees if you come over from Verizon, and will switch your number over for free.

Two months after launching the Chromecast Audio, Google has already updated the features of the cast streaming hardware.

The Chromecast Audio allows you to stream your favorite music from your phone, tablet or PC directly to existing speakers as long as they have a headphone jack.

Here are the new features:

According to a new report, Apple is developing its own GPU, and it's been in the works for at least three years.

Says the report: "Apple is making its GPU to cut the cord from Imagination Technologies a company that makes its IP (Intellectual Property) for the GPU."

If accurate, Apple would soon be able to offer their phones and tablets with in-house SoCs that feature A-series CPUs and their own GPUs, likely improving their already hefty margins.

According to Valve, 77,000 Steam accounts are hijacked every month, and the company is trying to fight back.

The company says when they launched Steam Trading, the accounts began getting stolen at 20 times the rate they previously were, and while Valve protected the victims there were plenty of pitfalls for the full trading economy, especially as it diluted the value of rare items.

"What used to be a handful of hackers is now a highly effective, organized network, in the business of stealing and selling items. It would be easier for them to go after the users who don't understand how to stay secure online, but the prevalence of items make it worthwhile to target everyone. We see around 77,000 accounts hijacked and pillaged each month. These are not new or naïve users; these are professional CS:GO players, reddit contributors, item traders, etc. Users can be targeted randomly as part of a larger group or even individually. Hackers can wait months for a payoff, all the while relentlessly attempting to gain access. It's a losing battle to protect your items against someone who steals them for a living," says Valve in an open letter to users.

To counteract the hackers, Valve says it has "worked to improve account security features, closed loopholes, improved how and when we message users that their account is at risk, added self-locking, and created the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator (two-factor authentication)," and it is imploring users to sign up for the Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator as soon as possible to protect their accounts.